


Paper Flower

by Maeday



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: M/M, Pre-Movie, beginning relationship, some violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-04
Updated: 2012-12-04
Packaged: 2017-11-20 06:35:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/582353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maeday/pseuds/Maeday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint Barton has done a lot of running in his life. People say you should slow down and smell the flowers. He’s pretty sure they didn’t mean get shot and smell the flowers while slowly dying from blood loss.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paper Flower

Clint spent a lot of time running.

It was just a part of his life that he had long since accepted. When he was a child he spent a lot of time running from his father and paying for it dearly. When he was in the orphanage he spent a lot of time running from the other children. At the circus he spent a lot of time running from the people who wanted to teach him a lesson. When he left the circus he spent a lot of time running from the police after he was connected to robberies and prostitution. When he accidentally got into the business of killing people for money he spent a lot of time running from people who wanted to kill him in turn.

The agent in the sharp suit had told him that SHIELD was different but so far Clint Barton had just done more running. Always from people that wanted to kill him and not always for something that he had necessarily done. It was all quite unfair.

So naturally it was no surprise that he was running again - in broad daylight, weaving between dilapidated houses and local people who looked less concerned about him carrying a gun while he ran and more concerned about the number of brightly colored fruits that he managed to knock down to try to slow down his pursuers.

The comm unit that he was supposed to use to contact SHIELD for backup had long since been knocked out of his ear, back when a couple of his target’s own assassins managed to get the jump on him and they had a good tussle on the rooftop. But Clint fought dirty in a kind of wild, uncontrollable way that had surprised them just enough to let him escape and get enough of a head start to feel slightly hopeful about making it to the evac point that he was hoping contained some kind of transport.

The sniper rifle he had been using was still on the rooftop, thankfully free of any identifying marks that could lead back to him or SHIELD should the local authorities find it. Clint figured it didn’t matter at this point if his target managed to get a hold of the rifle. It was pretty obvious who was behind the attempted hit. Clint had the SHIELD badge on his shoulder and everything. He still had a handgun though and he was checking it while he ran to make sure that it was ready to fire should he need to use it. Or should his attackers get too close.

He stumbled just a bit when the houses suddenly stopped abruptly and he found himself in a wide open meadow surrounded by thin trees and definitely of no use for cover. He turned slightly, attempting to go back into the cover of the houses even if it meant that the people chasing him had cover too. In the moment that he turned he saw one of the assassins out of the corner of his eye, just coming from the break in the houses, arm already raised with a gun in his hand. Only a quick roll saved him from taking the bullet right to his chest. It nicked his arm instead and he let out a hiss when he rolled onto it. 

He dropped into the grass, trying to regain his feet somewhere that he had more cover but the assassins seemed to have scrounged up some buddies and suddenly he was facing down not two assassins but five and all of them armed. He tried to get to the trees but another shot tore through him and this time he didn’t managed to dodge it. He couldn’t help the yell of pain when it went through his back and out from his stomach. Well, he assumed it managed to exit. He really hoped it did but he was a little bit distracted by the sheer pain of being shot. 

There were more bangs of guns being fired but he was already down in the grass, too far away from tree cover to save himself and basically out in a wide open field of tall, uncut grass that wouldn’t cover him enough if he tried to crawl away. The shots quieted and he could hear them talking hazily but they weren’t speaking English so he couldn’t be bothered to listen to them. He tried to curl in on himself when he heard them walking towards him but his stomach muscles shrieked angrily and he settled for flopping loosely on his back.

One of them nudged him with a toe and he groaned. They exchanged more words and one of them tipped him over roughly and peered down into his eyes. He was sure the assassins weren’t supposed to look so blurry. They snapped more words and the one closest to him tapped him right between the eyes with the butt of his gun. 

And then they left him there, bleeding out in a stupid, giant green field with flowers and a blue sky overhead. 

Clint stared up at the sky, too foggy headed with pain to comprehend that he had just been left to die and too confused by what had happened to hope that one of the towns people would come out to see what had happened and find him. Instead he just lay there, as quietly as he could while he was breathing harshly through pain and trying to press down on the wound in his stomach even though he knew that more of the blood was coming out of his back beneath him.

He tipped his head slightly to the left. There were flowers everywhere. The one closest to him waved slightly in the breeze, happily. He lifted his injured arm up as much as he could and plucked it from the ground. He held it up over his eyes so he could see it better. It was red. Of course it was red. He wondered if it was the same color as his blood. It looked like paper. His muscles wavered and he let the hand holding the flower fall down onto his chest.

He must have fallen unconscious because when he opened his eyes again he was surrounded by people that he knew, people in SHIELD uniforms who were barking orders at each other and into comm units and he was carefully being lifted onto a gurney and someone was strapping him down so he wouldn’t flail. He didn’t let go of the flower though even when they tried to pry it from his fingers.

The agent with the sharp suit appeared from the small crowd, looking completely unconcerned about Clint’s safety. 

“You were supposed to call for backup, Specialist,” the man said blandly.

Clint offered him a weary smile that probably looked more like a grimace. “Lost the comm early on.”

“Don’t do that again,” the man answered.

“Yessir. Won’t do it again.”

The people that Clint vaguely recognized as medical personnel by their uniforms were trying to get him to be quiet so they could put an oxygen mask on him. He raised a hand to try to put it away and realized that the flower was still in his fingers. It looked a little wilted and a little less red than it had before. He tried for a smile and held it out to the agent in the sharp suit.

“Got something for you,” he said with as much of his usual bravado as he could muster.

The agent raised his eyebrows but plucked the flower from his hands. 

“Keep it forever,” Clint muttered as he allowed the medics to put the oxygen mask over his face. He thought he remembered saying that before, a long time ago when there was a picture of a red flower on a stained refrigerator.

“If you insist,” the agent answered.

Clint would have said, “I do insist,” but he was too busy falling unconscious again.

Years later Clint found that flower pressed and dried between the pages of one of Phil Coulson’s favorite books. But he didn’t say anything about it. He just smiled quietly and put the book back on the shelf.


End file.
